Monday, 18 February 2013

Are autonomous home educators more prone to anger than other people?

I am constantly amazed at the ferocious anger which seems to bubble away under the surface of some autonomous home educators. It is of a type and degree that one seldom sees in the more structured educators and one has the impression that these are people who are probably simmering away all the time; ready to erupt in a second at some fancied slight or criticism. Of course, one also encounters such people among those who send their children to school, but there they are definitely a tiny minority. Among autonomous home educators, this kind of parent appears to be alarmingly common!

Now I am aware that I can be an irritating person, but the responses to what I say here go beyond all reason. Any normal person stumbling across a blog whose author seems to be an annoying fool, will simply move on and find another, more congenial place, to hang out in cyberspace. Not so the autonomous educators! They pop up here regularly and are always furious. I have remarked before on how curious this is. I am not after all attacking them personally. Indeed, because they are too cowardly in general to sign their names to the rude messages which they leave here, I could hardly do so, even if I wanted. No, they are angry because I express scepticism and ask questions about an educational theory which they favour. This is truly extraordinary.

As a home educator, I took it for granted that many people, especially those who had sent their children to school, would disapprove of my choice. So it proved, with a lot of parents making ill-informed comments about the matter. This never made me angry; why on earth would it? This was my choice and there are bound to be people who have made different choices about education to that which I made. With quite a few autonomous types though, even asking questions is enough to drive them to fury!

On the thread ‘No wonder local authorities are alarmed about home education!’, I was having a little light-hearted discussion yesterday about Albert Einstein and the extent to which his schooling contributed towards his success as a physicist. You would have thought that this was a completely neutral topic about nobody would be likely to grow cross. You would have thought this, until I tell you that a number of autonomous educators were involved in the debate! I asked a few questions, always a mistake with those people, and even made one or two humorous observations. I recommend readers to have a look at the increasingly heated comments which this provoked. It ended with two people commenting, using the expressions;

'shows himself up to be the arrogant ignoramus that he is.'' truly repressed, narrow minded & pompously ignorant twonk '

Now all this is very unfortunate. There are serious points to be made here; about the extent to which somebody who attends school from the age of five can be said to be an autonomous learner, how much formal schooling contributed to Einstein’s education and various other points. It is also worth talking about the way in which Einstein is sometimes invoked as an authority on topics other than physics and his name used to support fringe beliefs. Readers with long memories might recall this being done both with Immanuel Velikovsky’s theories and also the idea of biorhythms. Any attempt to talk reasonably about the topic though, ends in vitriolic rudeness.

I wonder if this says anything useful about the sort of person who chooses autonomous education? Are they more commonly angry individuals than ordinary people? Is it because they are more likely to be opposed to schools and teachers? Or do they perhaps feel sensitive and unsure about their chosen educational technique and believe that when somebody asks questions, then the best defence is attack? If the incident yesterday were a one-off, it would be one thing, but it is not. Nor is the level of anger which we regularly see here, restricted to me. It is directed against all who question this ideology. I have an idea that this is more a psychological or sociological problem than one relating to education per se and I will be turning the matter over in my mind when I have a chance and letting readers know what I conclude.

Anyone still bothering to read these diatribes go and read the comments on the ‘No wonder local authorities are alarmed about home education!’ post and decide for yourselves who it is that has a psychological problem.

As you've said before, Simon, a tiny, tiny minority of home educators are active on the net, so it'd make sense for them to be the more committed sort. The rest of the autonomous educators are probably happily and calmly getting on with educating their children and do not even know you exist.

That isn't aimed to put you down, but my statistical geekiness tends to escape whenever I see a question phrased like that. Rewrite it as 'Are the autonomous home educators I come in contact with angrier than other groups of people I come in contact with?' and the answer will probably be 'yes' because it is their views that you are against.

I annoy select groups of people every bit as much as you do, but they are a small sample and not representative of a wider culture. (For instance, at least one of the subsets of people who wish I'd go away and never come back would be local LA SEN officers. That does not mean that LA SEN officers as a whole are more prone to anger and difficulties with the truth than any other section of the population. Unless, to show my age by quoting from 'That's Life' you know different.)

'It *is* a psychological problem known as projection - you know someone is angry but you cannot admit that you are angry so you project your anger outwards onto the commentators on this blog.'

Ah, I think I see what you mean. You are saying that the people using such expressions as, 'arrogant ignoramus' and 'repressed, narrow minded and pompously ignorant twonk' are not really angry; it is just my own anger which causes me to interpret these remarks as coming form rude and angry people. Have I got that right?

'Rewrite it as 'Are the autonomous home educators I come in contact with angrier than other groups of people I come in contact with?'

If this was just me, then I would be inclined to agree with you, but it is not. On all the blogs, lists and groups where you find home educators, the autonomous ones are often marked out by their anger and aggression. One seldom sees either anger or aggression from other people when discussing home education and so it rather stands out. I don't think that this is simply some statistical artifact; I think that those who promote this approach might genuinely be more prone to anger than ordinary parents.

'It is just your own behaviour, so very resistant to reasonable argument, so very attached to your own warped view, that makes people eventually just tell the unvarnished truth'

Well of course, I have precisely the same perspective, but it does not impel me to describe people as narrow minded and ignorant! I must point out that it is hardly the 'unvarnished truth' that I am an arrogant ignoramus. It is merely a personal opinion, crudely expressed.

**Snort** you really have no idea how much the people you think are angry are actually wetting themselves laughing. Cue Webb's blog tomorrow "Are autonomous home educators more prone to urinary incontinence than other people?"

"You are saying that the people using such expressions as, 'arrogant ignoramus' and 'repressed, narrow minded and pompously ignorant twonk' are not really angry; it is just my own anger which causes me to interpret these remarks as coming form rude and angry people. Have I got that right?"

I am not an autonomous home educator, angry or otherwise, although I have become an autonomous learner in my middle age. I have many friends who are autonomous home educators and .... well, we must be mixing in different circles.... or your ability to discern fact from fiction is well and truly broken! Quite frankly they are the wittiest, belly bustingly hilarious lot & I think you've been taken for a ride! Quit while you can lest your own anger get the better of you :/

I agree with the comments here; the only anger I have seen truly directed at you Simon is borne of people's frustration at your continual need to bring the conversation into a framework that aims to discredit and attack the choices made by autonomous HEers, sacrificing substance for digs.

Your last post about a 14 year old human let down by the education system was reinvented by you to be a damning indictment of HE, yet after a simple couple of questions from those same 'angry' (again I would say frustrated with your agenda) HEers, you were quite happy to admit that the family of the boy ASKED for your help, therefore making them a completely inappropriate example for your pointed attack.

I think that's where I'm going with this comment; you have shown yourself time and time again to have an agenda against autonomous HEers, who you are (as far as I'm concerned) attacking.

This post asking if those who are continually being attacked by you are more angry than other groups....I mean, do you really think you are part of the solution or part of the problem?

I attribute you with a decent amount of common sense, so I have to conclude that you know exactly what you're doing, and those who you are continually attacking, and no doubt those you are trying to impress with these attacks, are aware of what you're doing.

Simon wrote,"There are serious points to be made here; about the extent to which somebody who attends school from the age of five can be said to be an autonomous learner, how much formal schooling contributed to Einstein’s education and various other points."

Imagine someone who daydreams away their time at school and educates themselves at home, and you have your answer as to the possibilities. Take then the description of Einstein's education in his biography, his maths and science education taking place mainly at home via self study and discussions with his Uncle and a family friend, and it's easy to see that someone can be autonomously educated despite spending time in a school building at other times. Everyone is autonomously educated to some extent - unless you are suggesting that all learning ends when instruction from a teacher stops?

It's clear that Einstein believed that schooling harms learning and autonomous education is the ideal way to learn. Do you dispute his interpretation of his own experiences, or do you doubt that he learnt the majority of his maths and science at home?

As to anger; I think it depends on the tone of voice you 'hear' when you read the comments. Try reading them in a relaxed, amused tone of voice as I do, and you gain a completely different impression.

I shall be posting on this subject tomorrow. In the meantime, I shall say that obviously the home background and family influence upon a child is greater than that of the school. Nobody doubts that for a moment and I mentioned a few days ago that some recent research suggests that this influence is five times as great as the school's. Nor would any sensible person deny that children are able to learn outside school, under their own steam.

'As to anger; I think it depends on the tone of voice you 'hear' when you read the comments. Try reading them in a relaxed, amused tone of voice as I do, and you gain a completely different impression.'

These people are not known to me; they are complete strangers. The best way to try out your suggestion would be to strike up a conversation with a complete stranger in a pub or at a bus stop and then, after they have expressed their view on education, for you to say in an amused tone of voice, "My, you really are an arrogant ignoramus!' or perhaps, 'Goodness, what a truly repressed and narrow minded person you must be.'

I do not recommend the above experiment, mind, but if this is what you are suggesting, I can only say that I feel that you are mistaken.

I am somewhat staggered at the idea that some of the people commenting here think that it is fine to tell complete and utter strangers that they are narrow minded, repressed and arrogant; as long as you remember to make your tone of voice amused! Would this really lessen the offence caused or would it just irriate the strangers even more and make them think that you were mocking them?

I am very much afraid that I shall feel compelled to assume that anybody who believes this to be true must surely be suffering from a catastrophic social skills deficit. Tell me, do any readers here habitually conduct themselves in this way in public? If so, could we have a little feedback about the reactions of strangers when insulted in this way? I am intrigued by this. I have been accused of drawing unwarranted inferences about autonomous educators in general, based on too small a sample, but this really is an idea that I have never in my life heard anybody else putting forward. How common is this behaviour among autonomously educating parents and what sort of consequences do they see? (By which I suppose I really mean, how many black eyes and bloody noses does the average autonomous educator pick up in the course of a week; inflicted by irate strangers? I can feel another post coming on and who can blame me this time?)

"Would this really lessen the offence caused or would it just irriate the strangers even more and make them think that you were mocking them?"

Of course not, but people are disputing your interpretation that autonomous educators are necessarily angry which is, after all, the topic of your post. Now if you had said that autonomous educators commenting on your blog are rude and that you felt insulted, then you may have had point...

"It's now very common to hear people say, 'I'm rather offended by that.' As if that gives them certain rights. It's actually nothing more... than a whine. 'I find that offensive.' It has no meaning; it has no purpose; it has no reason to be respected as a phrase. 'I am offended by that.' Well, so fucking what." ~ Stephen Fry

'"It's now very common to hear people say, 'I'm rather offended by that.' As if that gives them certain rights. It's actually nothing more... than a whine. 'I find that offensive.' It has no meaning; it has no purpose; it has no reason to be respected as a phrase. 'I am offended by that.' Well, so fucking what." ~ Stephen Fry'

Interesting, but hardly relevant. I was not offended, nor did I say that I was. I simply observed that the people making those remarks struck me as being rude and angry. Nothing said so far has given me any cause to change my mind about this.

I am still not sure whether it is common for autonomous home educators to go around telling strangers in an amused tone of voice that they are narrow minded, repressed and ignorant. I have never in all my life heard of this sort of thing being done without great unpleasantness resulting. Nobody who has so far commented seemed to find anything unusual about the proceding though, which leads me to suspect that any difficulty those commenting here have experienced with schools, local authority officers or anybody else has probably been of their own making.

Of course, this is only a small sample, but I think it is likely that we have a at least half a dozen people here who feel that this way of carrying on is perfectly normal. Are those commenting here weird and atypical or are they pretty representative of autonomous educators as a whole?

You are being completely disingenuous with this thread Simon. What happens on this blog is in no way comparable to an exchange of opinions between strangers. You spin, twist, selectively quote, quote out of context and misrepresent people. You ignore anything that doesn't fit your preconceptions and insist you have access to knowledge about people that they don't have themselves. For example they tell you they are not angry - you insist they are. You are quite shameless, you have even misrepresented one of the people you quote in today's post So don't throw your hands up and pretend you cannot understand why people get arsey with you. If you cannot understand then the deficiency in social skills is all yours and you are projecting again. Rosencrantz spelled out for you the problems with your writing and you chose to whine "He doesn't like me" instead of taking those criticisms on board. You have created your own rod.

'you have even misrepresented one of the people you quote in today's post '

Well, I don't know who I was quoting today, because of course, as usual, the individual was too ashamed to sign his or her own name to what was said. I am pretty sure that I did not misquote the person though. Perhaps you could tell me how I have done this and if true I shall certainly apologise.

' For example they tell you they are not angry - you insist they are'

You seem to be saying here that the people whom I quoted have said that they are not angry. This may have happened, but how would I know? Both the people who made those rude and angry comments and all those who have subsequently said anything about this, with one exception of course, have done so anonymously. How am I supposed to know that the two people I have quoted have told me that they were not angry, unless they tell me so?

'the individual was too ashamed to sign his or her own name to what was said.'

That's not the reason people don't sign their names here, as you well know.

Those of us who used to sign our names have had witch hunts directed against us. You go trawling the internet looking for personal details about family members/lifestyles etc in order to make spiteful remarks.

THAT is why people remain anonymous here. Except Anne. So far.

If you wrote about HE rather than HE'ers, people might be more inclined to sign their names.

I have been accused of misrepresenting the people who made these comments, as well as spinning and twisting their words. Here, to be fair, are the comments in full:

"nobody is an expert in every field."... & some Nobodies aren't expert in any field... as Mr. Webb is proof of time & again!... ...Does ANYBODY actually visit this blog in seriousness? Or, like myself, are we all just here for a chuckle & to see what a truly repressed, narrow minded & pompously ignorant twonk looks like?

If anything, the full comment is even ruder than the short part which I quoted here. I did not quote the whole of the next comment, because I ma a little dubious about it. A 'scholarship to university'? There is of course no such thing, which makes me suspect that this comment is an invention. How would the parent know that their child was a 'top student in college'? Colleges don't publish tables showing how each student is doing academically, so that you can compare them with the others in their group. Still, here is the whole thing. As I say, it looks distinctly fishy to me!

I am the parent of the calculus child and I thought I'd mention that this child spent well over a year playing computer games and little else. This young person is now studying four A levels including maths, further maths and computer programing and is a top student in college looking at four A grades at A level and scholarship to university do an M Math or M Eng. This child has not received any formal teaching, including in reading and is most certainly extremely literate and numerate. Thankfully Simon Webb was never on my child's case. If Webb wants to argue my child did not receive an education then he simply shows himself up to be the arrogant ignoramus that he is.

I know that my child is a top child because I attend parent evenings every term and this is what my child's tutors tell me. I also receive all my child's marks by email. No such thing as scholarships to university? Well it would appear that the ignorant comment was correct in any case. Google undergraduate scholarship. I assume this means the standard of your daughter's education at home was not high enough for her to achieve one.

Hmmm so both the people quoted have now confirmed they were not angry. Will this stop Simon from constructing a fanciful vision of angry educators with psychological issues and children at risk? Answers on a postcard....

'You have written ad nauseam about how much you detest autonomous education and how dangerous you belive its practictioners to be. Thus, they feel they *know* you, even if you don't know their names.'

This is absurd. Richard Dawkins says many rude things in print about people like me who believe in God. When I met him a few years ago, do you really think that I would have told him in an amused tone that he was ignorant, narrow minded and repressed? Reading somebody's views does not make the person any less of a stranger. That so many people commenting here in this way have this point of view is making me suspect even mmore strongly that some at least are architects of their own misfortune. If they carry on like this, no wonder they have so many rows with teachers and local authorities.

Ah, I seem to have offended you. This is unacceptable and I can only offer you my most sincere... No, hang on a moment, that can't be right! Didn't somebody post something to the effect that we should not apologise when we cause offence? Yes, here it is:

"It's now very common to hear people say, 'I'm rather offended by that.' As if that gives them certain rights. It's actually nothing more... than a whine. 'I find that offensive.' It has no meaning; it has no purpose; it has no reason to be respected as a phrase. 'I am offended by that.' Well, so fucking what." ~ Stephen Fry

I hope that this meets the case, as somebody else commenting here felt that it should.

Seriously though, those scholarships are generally known in university life as bursaries and this is what confused me. I remain dubious about both your child's college emailing you his marks, FE colleges will give no information of this sort in general to parents, due to the data protection act. As to whether or not you are a rude and angry person, nothing you have said has given me any reason to change my mind.

No I wasn't offended. I simply do not appreciate being misrepresented. If you had a shred of integrity you would apologise for doing so. However, this has been a most illuminating exchange which, I think, demonstrates not only what is wrong with your thinking but also your character deficiencies and explains why some people get angry with you.

You will never admit to being wrong - I wrote here about a scholarship to university. You poo pooed this saying such things do not exist. I suggested you google undergraduate scholarships and you discovered that you were wrong. However you were unable to admit this so you came back claiming these were referred to as bursaries. However I have to tell you you are wrong again. The universities my child has shortlisted refer to these as scholarships.

You are happy to publicly call your correspondents liars rather than concede a point that challenges your world view. For the record, my child's college does indeed email results to parents, it also posts them and communicates them directly at termly parents' evenings. But rather than admit that my child did extremely well under autonomous education you prefer to pretend you know more about how my child's college communicates with me than I do. You do this because you want to try and discredit what I have said because you do not wish to have to integrate any information that challenges your dogma about learning and education.

You delude yourself that your opinion about someone else's inner life is somehow more authentic than their own voice. I have told you that I was not angry, yet you imagine you have some priviledged access to the inside of my head and are more qualified to judge my emotional state than I am. In much the same way you imagine yourself more able to say what learning style benefitted Einstein than Einstein himself.

When you override what another person tells you about themselves, pretending you know better, when you refuse to apologise for misrepresenting people, when you find it preferable to call people liars rather than have your views challenged - you should not be surprised if people get annoyed. It is not a sign that your insight and wisdom is making them uncomfortable, however much you like to pretend it is.

Your behaviour on this thread amply demonstrates, if any were unsure, that you are incapable of rational discourse and your purpose in writing is not to gain knowledge but to pretend that the knowledge you think you have is invincible.

In fact it is your ignorance that you demonstrate to be invincible. I say this not out of anger or rudeness but as a statement of what you have shown here.